How Leadership Overcomes Organizational Divisions in Bim- Enabled Commerical Construction

Proponents of Building Information Modeling (or BIM) often claim that the adoption of these technologies will lead to greater efficiencies through increased collaboration. In this paper, we present findings from a research project that explores the use of BIM technologies for mechanical, electrical, plumbing, and fire life safety (known often collectively as MEP) systems coordination and the impact of this technology on collaboration and communication. We selected MEP coordination because it is a synecdoche, or a part that is representative of the whole, of the challenges across the entire process of collaboration in architecture, engineering, and construction. In an 11-month ethnographic study of the BIM-enabled MEP coordination process for two commercial construction projects and 65 industry interviews, we find that BIM-enabled projects are often tightly coupled technologically, but loosely coupled organizationally. In this paper, we focus on two aspects of these findings in particular. First, obligations to individual work scope or to a particular company can jeopardize project cohesion. Second, individual leadership—especially of the MEP coordinator in the teams we studied—often substitutes for stronger project organization. We argue while that cross-company project teams are often more technologically connected using BIM, there are other forces that must be considered and organizationally engineered in order for BIM to be implemented successfully.